SKYWATCHERS across East Lancashire caught a rare celestial show on Tuesday night.
The lunar event, known as a ‘blood moon’, was caused by the earth's shadow falling across the moon and was caught on camera over Rishton by a keen-eyed Andy Bellard.
It caused a total eclipse which wasn’t visible in the UK but changed the colour of the moon because Mars had aligned with the sun.
The first eclipse of 2014 was visible across most of North America, Latin America and the Caribbean.
The total lunar eclipse unfolded over three hours as the moon moved into the earth's shadow.
Observers in north-west Africa and the eastern half of South America were able to see part of the eclipse, but missed some stages because they occurred after moonset.
Andy said: “I was listening to the football around 9pm when the commentator said that the moon had turned red.
“I went to the window and rushed outside to take a picture of it.
“It was spectacular and I’ve never seen anything like that before in my life. It was amazing to see this red orb rising into the sky.
“Half an hour later it had turned back to silver.